


Cookies

by caffeinatedmusing



Series: Adventures of an Altmer Rogue [2]
Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: College Student, Cookies, Family Fluff, Gen, teaching children the importance of lockpicking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-21
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2019-02-05 05:50:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12788388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caffeinatedmusing/pseuds/caffeinatedmusing
Summary: A little misbehavior after a stressful day helps keep life, and Ceirin's sanity, in balance.





	Cookies

Ceirin dropped his bag on the floor and kicked off his shoes before flopping down on his bed with a sigh. Class had been a circus today. One professor had changed a group project deadline and the details on another upcoming assignment at the last minute. He had also heard back that one of his group members had dropped the course and another had complained about him, stating ‘unethical research habits’. He’d been flat out asked to stick to the approved materials. 

It meant they’d be turning in an assignment that would be no more or less than a copy of every previous years assignment ever done by any student ever. What was the point? How did anyone learn from mindless repetition? He’d been struck once again with the feeling that his ‘higher’ education was just an expensive waste of his time. 

The frustration had led to an argument with his remaining group members about how they were supposed to present an original research paper on any subject with only one-sided sources. 

After spending the entire afternoon ransacking the campus library for anything that might help, they had been able to come up with only one new source and it was heavy on speculation and generally not well thought of by the staff. The others had gone home in dismay and Ceirin had stayed later in the vain hope of finding anything else. 

When he’d voiced his concerns to his advisor, it had resulted in yet another lecture about how he really owed his instructors respect for their abilities and the time they put into teaching and that if he wasn’t careful he might find even fewer future prospects than he had already, which was nearly none given that he couldn’t cast a spell without blacking out. 

Stress had ruled the day. He’d ended up commiserating with another deadline- harried student while they’d smoked nirnroot together outside in the shade behind the maintenance buildings.

Overdue assignments waited in his bag and there were more on his desk, but for the moment all he wanted was a nap. His stomach growled. Well, and maybe a snack. Dinner wouldn’t be served for hours.

Heaving himself up off the bed, he wandered down stairs, poking his head into his mother’s office briefly to verify that she was not at home. Father was shut up in his writing studio above the garden shed again, so he need not worry about anyone catching him raiding the pantry. 

“Ceirin!”

As he stood in the kitchen debating about what he wanted, the sound of a door slamming and small bare feet slapping fast across the tile announced his little brothers arrival well before Elsirion’s small body slammed into Ceirin’s legs. _Well, almost anyone._

“You’re home!” Siri beamed up at him.

“Yeah. And so are you.” He lifted the four year old up to his hip. “Oof, I think you grew today.”

“Uh huh.” Elsirion nodded, brown hair flopping over his eyes. 

Ceirin tucked it back behind one little pointed ear but it soon flopped forward again. “You want a snack, little brother?”

Elsirion’s eyes lit up at the mention of food. “Yeah. But don’t let Nan see you or she’ll hit you. She put the cookies away, too.” One chubby little finger pointed up at a cabinet. A locked cabinet.

Ceirin frowned over the ‘or she’ll hit you’ bit as he worked out what must have happened. Sure enough, there was a bruise on the back of one of Siri’s hands, about what a wooden spoon might have left if used to overzealously smack at small cookie-grabbing hands. Their nanny had strict instructions not to use physical discipline against her charge; she was to take any issues that might require it straight to her employers. But, Ceirin also knew his mother’s working hours. As for his father, well, their mother liked to joke that when Arncurion got to writing, nothing short of an act of Aedra or Daedra could get him to come out of his studio and probably not even then. 

It seemed the nanny had taken liberties with Elsirion. He’d be sure to leave a note for his mother. Assuming he didn’t run into the nanny, herself, first.

“She put the cookies up there, huh?”

“It’s locked. We can’t. I climbed on a chair and everything.”

“Oh, you did, did you?” Ceirin chuckled. He’d done the same when he’d been little. He had a fond memory of being small enough to actually fit inside that cabinet but then getting stuck because he’d been afraid to climb back down so he’d just stayed there and fallen asleep. Later, he’d scared his father half to death when Arncurion had opened it to get a glass down and found him. “Well, I have something right here that can unlock them but you have to promise not to tell.”

Elsirion solemnly put a finger up over his lips, which were pressed together until they’d turned pale. 

Setting his little brother down on the countertop, Ceirin pulled one of the hairpins from his half tail braid. He showed Elsirion how to use it to pop open the lock. Once Siri got it, Ceirin lifted their prize down. Then he tucked the pin into Siri’s hair, keeping the long part from flopping back over his eyes.

They ate the cookies together; Ceirin leaning against the counter while Elsirion sat on it, skinny little legs swinging so his heels thumped an irregular percussion against the lower drawers while he chattered on about what he’d done that day; coloring and then lessons; he’d learned a new spell today, did Ceirin want to see it? And then a mage light was floating up above them before Ceirin could begin to answer.

When Ceirin had gotten home, Elsirion had apparently been in the process of trying to catch a rabbit he had seen in the herb garden because the gardener had said people sometimes kept them as pets and did Ceirin think their parents would let him keep it, if he could catch it? 

The barrage of happiness and cookie crumbs eased the stress of Ceirin’s day. His papers and assignments could wait. He let Elsirion tow him outside to show him where he had seen the rabbit.

That and putting the empty jar back and relocking the cabinet. Some magic tricks he _could_ do.


End file.
